In reading the accusations and final settlement tho it kinda appears to me Blodget was Merrill-Lynch's sacrificial lamb.

From the settlement:"The pressures put on the Merrill Lynch internet group to appease both investment bankers and clients led the group to ignore the bottom two categories of the five-point rating system (“reduce” and “sell”) and to use only the remaining ratings (“buy”, “accumulate” and “neutral”). The absence of clear guidance from Merrill Lynch management on how to resolve the conflicts created by these pressures led respondent Henry Blodget, the head of the internet group, in a moment of candor, to threaten to “start calling the stocks (stocks, not companies)... like we see them, no matter what the ancillary business consequences are.”http://www.ag.ny.gov/sites/default/files/press-releases/archived/testimony7.pdfhttp://www.ag.ny.gov/sites/default/files/press-releases/archived/MerrillL.pdfEdited by Gatorguy - 5/19/14 at 11:49am

In reading the accusations and final settlement tho it kinda appears to me Blodget was Merrill-Lynch's sacrificial lamb.

From the settlement:"The pressures put on the Merrill Lynch internet group to appease both investment bankers and clients led the group to ignore the bottom two categories of the five-point rating system (“reduce” and “sell”) and to use only the remaining ratings (“buy”, “accumulate” and “neutral”). The absence of clear guidance from Merrill Lynch management on how to resolve the conflicts created by these pressures led respondent Henry Blodget, the head of the internet group, in a moment of candor, to threaten to “start calling the stocks (stocks, not companies)... like we see them, no matter what the ancillary business consequences are.”http://www.ag.ny.gov/sites/default/files/press-releases/archived/testimony7.pdfhttp://www.ag.ny.gov/sites/default/files/press-releases/archived/MerrillL.pdf

Which is why I made specific reference to the language in the Wikipedia entry.

Weird. Google I can understand. They'd stop with Android features ripping or iOS ones but samsung? They copy design, idea, add to vanilla android the most copied things and they also can't design they're own fridge or vacuum without copying and other company.

Talks are said to have reignited after Apple was found to have infringed on some Samsung patents in their most recent U.S. trial.

What a disingenuous and misleading statement. Apple infringed on a patent that samsung bought six months before the trial from another company. Lol. The article acts like samsung designed this patent. They didn't they bought it so they could countersue apple because they had nothing to go to trial with. In fact the patent was only mentioned in the closing arguments for a brief few minutes which goes to show that samsung really didn't care about it other than to save face with having nothing.

No. Wrong. People PAID BY SAMSUNG spew paper mache rhetoric on the Internet. Regular people don’t see Apple in anything but a favorable light, and real people online–not paid to whore themselves out to Samsung–don’t, either.

…and labelled a patent troll…

Anyone labeling Apple a patent troll is instantly outed as a complete idiot, knowing nothing whatsoever about patents or the use of that phrase. Their “opinion”–paid or otherwise–is therefore also invalidated.

…while Samsung gets free marketing…

I guess for a company that “leads by following” you could consider “publicly outed as a THIEF and LIAR” being “free marketing”…

…a tiny fine and possibly an injunction that means they can’t sell two-year-old phones any more.

And precedent for future lawsuits against more modern products, which Apple has been using thus far.

What Apple says: "Samsung has copied our products".

What uninformed people hear: "Samsung products are the same as iPhones".

Those are the people who aren’t buying the devices in the first place. No, that’s not at all what uninformed people hear.